Horten's Incredible Illusions (13 page)
Stuart grabbed the magic star from its socket and beckoned her over to a corner.
“Dad used the star,” he whispered, holding it up so she could see that there were only three spokes left.
“
What?
“
“Accidentally. And I caught hold of him and managed to go along too. Sorry, it was an accident—it happened when we were trying to fold the fan. And you were right about how it’s done.”
He could see her struggling with disappointment.
“So what was the adventure like?” she asked, a bit glumly.
He thought for a moment; it was hard to describe it in the kind of words that he normally used. “Peculiar, unpredictable, frustrating, extraordinary,” he said.
“You’re sounding like your dad,” remarked April, managing a small smile.
The door opened with a bang, and Rod Felton strode in.
“Splendid news,” he said in his usual enthusiastic bellow. “The TV people are interested.
Midlands at Midday
wants to do a live feature on our special magical exhibition, and they’re sending a camera crew around in the morning. Can you be here at nine sharp?” he asked, glancing from Stuart to April.
They nodded, and then looked at each other.
“We’re going to be famous!” whispered April, grinning with excitement. “I must tell May and June,” she added. “They can come along and report on it for the
Beech Road Guardian
.”
“And could you be here too?” the curator asked Stuart’s father. “I’ve had a rather brilliant idea about how to drum up advance interest in the Roman Beeton exhibition as well, and I need someone who can tell a strigil from a hypocaust.” He laughed as if he’d just told a joke, and Stuart’s father laughed as if he’d just heard one.
“I should be honored to assume such a role,” said Stuart’s father, and Rod Felton bounced happily out of the room again.
“Actually,” said April, “I’ve got another invitation. My mom wants to know if you two want to come over for a barbecue this evening. Dad’s cooking steaks.”
While April’s dad filled the backyard with smoke and May and June chopped up vegetables for coleslaw, April dragged Stuart into a corner by the shed and made him tell her every detail of the Amazing Maze.
“So the letters so far are
S
,
W
, and
O
,” she said, and chewed her lip for a moment or two. “And what about the mysterious phone call? You haven’t told me about that yet, either.”
“Oh, right …” Stuart hesitated. The thought of that strange and tempting conversation made him feel uncomfortable. “It was from a very old lady called Miss Edie who wants to buy Great-Uncle Tony’s tricks.”
“Why?”
“Well, that’s the odd thing. She said she had promised her grandmother, and that her grandmother had told her that Great-Uncle Tony hid a will in one of the tricks, leaving everything to the person who finds it, and—”
“Hang on,” interrupted April, flapping her hands. “You said that this Miss Edie was really old.”
“Yes.”
“So when did her grandmother die?”
“Eighty-five years ago.”
“So before Great-Uncle Tony was even
born
?”
“Yes.”
There was a long pause.
“Did she seem a bit crazy?” asked April tentatively.
“Not especially,” said Stuart.
“Okay, well, let’s ignore the grandma thing for the time being, it’s just too strange. This hidden will, though—presumably it’s the thing that all the letter clues are taking us toward. The note said:
Lead you to my W
—didn’t it? And I bet Miss Edie wants you to find it because then you’d be able to
prove
the tricks are yours, and you’d be free to sell them to her. But you wouldn’t do that, would you?”
“Wouldn’t do what?” asked Stuart, still flabbergasted (as ever) by how quick and clever April was.
She spoke again, her voice confident. “You wouldn’t sell your great-uncle’s fantastic legacy—which you had to work so hard to find—to some woman you’d never met just because she offered you a ton of money?”
Stuart didn’t answer. In his head he could still hear Miss Edie’s crackly, insistent voice: “‘Being rich means you can get anything you want. What do you want, Stuart?’“
Over by the barbecue, Mr. Kingley was forking the steaks onto plates, and Stuart’s father was setting up a table and chairs. May (or June) lugged a bowl of salad from the house, and June (or May) started pouring out drinks.
“Grub’s up,” shouted Mr. Kingley.
Stuart got to his feet, his stomach rumbling.
“I’ve just thought of something quite funny,” said April, following him up the yard. “What if
I
found the will? Then the tricks would belong to
me
!”
Grinning, she went to sit down, but Stuart remained standing, and he wasn’t grinning at all. Though part of him knew that April was only joking, another part was seething with panic and jealousy.
They’re mine
, he thought,
not April’s. They’re mine to keep. And mine to sell.
When Rod Felton had said that a camera crew from
Midlands at Midday
would be turning up at the museum, Stuart had expected:
a) a cameraman
and, possibly,
b) a soundman.
What he hadn’t expected was:
c) an assistant to the cameraman
d) an assistant to the soundman
e) a man with a bag of tools and one thousand feet of cable
f) an assistant to the man with the bag of tools and one thousand feet of cable
g) an assistant to the assistant to the man with the bag of tools and one thousand feet of cable
h) a woman with a clipboard and a stopwatch
i) a man with headphones and a beard
j) another man who introduced himself as the producer and then stood around doing nothing
k) a teenage boy who got everybody a coffee and then stood around doing nothing
l) a woman who introduced herself as the director and then wandered around anxiously doing nothing but saying things like, “I don’t like the light in here,” and “How am I supposed to get my angles?” in a voice that sounded as if some terrible tragedy had just taken place
and finally,
m) a small dog.
For an hour Stuart and April stood in a corner and watched the producer and the director wander randomly around the room, pointing at things. They saw the assistant to the cameraman move a large lamp six times before replacing it with a small lamp. They saw the dog investigate every single item in the room before lying down in a patch of sunlight and going to sleep.
“What’s wrong with these people?” muttered April. “They’re so
slow
. Why can’t they make any decisions?”
“Hi there,” said the show’s producer, at last ambling over to see them. “We’re just waiting for the show’s host to arrive. When she comes, we’ll stick her in front of one of these trick thingies for the interview. Maybe she can sit on the big throne with all the flowers.”
“It’s actually called the Reappearing Rose Bower,” said April.
“Is it?” he asked, not sounding terribly interested. “Or we might go for that Wishing Well thingy. She could throw a coin in. Or maybe the red cupboard thingy with the swords.”
“You mean the Cabinet of Blood,” said April. “They’ve all got names, you know. And seeing as you haven’t decided yet, can I suggest you use the Fan of Fantasticality as a background? It’s really beautiful when it’s open, and we’ve worked out how to shut it as well. Do you want us to show you?”
“No, that’s okay,” said the producer.
“It’s no trouble. And it would definitely look really good. And the mirror arch is really impressive as well. Maybe you could start with a shot of that, and then one of us could actually hide inside the Pharaoh’s Pyramid and—”
The producer was beginning to look a bit irritated by April’s stream of suggestions, and Stuart was just about to give her a nudge to stop talking when the door opened and yet another person came in.
This time it was a tall and glamorous-looking woman with glossy chestnut hair, a cream suit, and shoes with heels so high that she was practically walking on tiptoe.
“
What
a drive I’ve had!” she exclaimed. “I barely knew that this town existed. It’s miles and miles and miles from anywhere!”
The producer hurried over to her, and so did the boy who got coffees, and there was some gesturing toward Stuart and April and a fair amount of whispering. Then the woman came over to them, her heels clacking on the wooden floor.
“Hi!” she said, looking down at Stuart. “I’m Rowena Allsopp.”
It was obvious from the way she said it that Stuart was supposed to know who she was. He glanced at April.
“Famous Midlands TV host,” muttered April out of the side of her mouth.
“Hello,” said Stuart. “You’re a famous Midlands TV host, aren’t you?”
“That’s right, and you’re the one who found Tiddly Tom’s magic tricks?”
“We both did,” corrected April quickly. “And his name wasn’t Tiddly Tom. It was Teeny-Tiny Tony Horten.”
“And how old are you?” asked Rowena, not even glancing at April. “Eight?”
“Ten,” replied Stuart.
“Oh.” Rowena sounded a bit disappointed.
“I’m ten too,” said April.
“Okay.” Rowena nodded, totally ignoring her. “Let me go and have a word with my producer.”
She click-clacked off again, and odd bits of the conversation floated back: “… see what you mean about the girl … more impact if the story’s just about the small fellow—we needn’t mention his age …” and then, rather faintly, “I can’t bear bossy kids …”
Stuart didn’t dare look at April, but out of the corner of his eye he could see her turning pink.
“I was just trying to help,” she said, a bit huffily. “I thought they should get their facts straight.”
Around them, things suddenly started getting busy. Rod Felton appeared, beaming at everyone. May and June Kingley sneaked in, May with her camera, June with a notebook. Plugs were plugged in, lights went on, the microphone was waved around, the dog was ushered away from the Fan of Fantasticality, where it had been sniffing interestedly, the producer shouted, “Going live in three minutes,” and Stuart found himself shoved in front of the Well of Wishes with Rowena beside him. Feeling half proud and half embarrassed, he grinned nervously at April, who was watching from the corner. She gave him a rather miserable thumbs-up in return.
“Counting down,” said the man with the beard. A red light blinked on the side of the camera. “Going live in ten seconds. Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four …” He held up three fingers, then two, then one, then pointed dramatically at Rowena.
“Incredible as it may
seem
,” she said, gazing into the lens, “the little town of
Beeton
, not previously known for
anything
of interest, has turned out to be the
hiding
place for a fantastic magician’s
workshop
. The magician was called Teeny-Tiddly Tommy
Norten
, and it was his very own
grandson
who made the dramatic
discovery
while watching a
talent
contest in Beeton
Park
. Here to tell us his incredible
story
is little Stuart
Norten
, who has gone from being a museum-hating
vandal
to being the
curator
of this exhibition.”
The camera tilted way down, as if it were filming a beetle crawling on the ground, and Stuart looked up at it, no longer half embarrassed, but totally, completely, and utterly embarrassed.
“I wasn’t a museum-hating vandal,” he said. “It was an accident.”
“So, Stuart, what
happened
when you found the workshop?” asked Rowena, talking to him as if he were a toddler.
“Well, me and my friend April saw that there was a bulletin board on the base of the bandstand, and we realized it was a bit loose, and when we looked behind it we realized there was a huge room underneath us….”
